Running and slashing. Slashing and running. Tried and true mechanics that date back to the days of Strider. Speaking of which, one of the brains behind the original Strider is behind yet another futuristic ninja title. Moon Diver, as it's called, is heavy on the running and slashing, but mixes it up by throwing in a dash of RPG style character progression and Crackdown-esque orb hunting. It's not ground breaking stuff by any means, but Moon Diver is well aware of it's limits and doesn't try to do too much. Fortunately, the old formula doesn't feel outdated or stale, and I'll even go as far to say it works to an extent.
Don't tell me you've forgotten about Outland already, have you? Housemarque's visually stimulating, projectile-laden platformer is due out soon. The last week of April in fact! Get yourself reaqcuainted with Outland via the following trailer, which spotlights cooperative play elements.
There's really not much to go by, so it's not known how intricate the co-op system will be. However, it looks like a worthy purchase even as a single player affair, so the addition of multiplayer is gravy baby. I came away from PAX East impressed with how Outland looked under player control. Smooth, sexy animation is a great compliment to lovely visuals, unique style, and the omnipresent hell of bullets, wouldn't you say?
Mark it on your calendars, April 26 on PSN ($9.99), April 27 on XBLA (800 MSP).
Have you ever wondered how Chell -- Aperture Science test subject and protagonist of the Portal series -- has survived all those nasty falls with nary a sprained ankle? It's gotta be the boots! For Valve and Aperture Laboratories fourth and final investment opportunity video, Cave Johnson explains it all.
So there you have it. Four good reasons to invest in Aperture Science. Though they appear to be between banks, so please make your checks out to cash. Portal 2 releases exactly one week from today, on April 19. We're done here!
If tearing stuff up with the powers of lightning alone wasn't enough for you in Infamous, today is your lucky day. In the latest trailer for Infamous 2, Cole is showing off some new powers, specifically those of fire and ice. Who made this guy a mage? Cone of cold, chain lightning, firebolt; you're dead, son!
Cole will not have all these skills available simultaneously, so takes your dreams back to World of Warcraft. A morality alignment with Kuo -- who represents 'good' -- will place ice powers at your behest. Similarly, an aligninment with Nix -- the 'bad' apple -- grants you fire manipulation. Now the choice between good and evil isn't simply how you're feeling after your day at work, the addition of an extra elemental skill set makes the decision that much tougher.
Aperture Laboratories introduces the consumer version of their most popular military grade product; turrets. The friendly and existential sentries are the focus of Valve's latest Aperture investment video series for Portal 2.
Honestly, who wouldn't want a turret in their home, protecting the things they love? I know I sure as hell would. When the sound of gunfire isn't echoing in your child's bedroom, set off by some dust particles, I'm fully confident that my infant will have the best sleep of his life, thanks in part to the Aperture Labs turret's soothing hum. Of course, I believe anything Cave Johnson tells me.
Portal 2 ships in just about two weeks. Make Cave proud, preorder now.
If you've been with me for a while, you know how much I'm looking forward to Brink. It's almost here; just a little more than a month until I can start talking friends out of wasting their time with CoD: BlOps and start playing something a little more fun, to say the least. Maybe it's unfair to compare the two, but I'm stoked that Brink encourages and rewards the mobile player, whereas most other modern shooters encourage camping. Boring!
The latest trailer details some of the customization you'll be able to play with on the abilities front. Things like turrets, hacks, extra life, sticky bombs and molotovs; you know, tools of the trade. Of course, your ability loadout all depends on the class you choose, allowing you to finetune your wall-running machine-gunning experience. Sure they're just perks, but when you combine them with all the other customization options, it seems like each individual player will be able to craft their own personal experience. That's going to go a hell of a long way.
I tend to take screenshots with a grain of salt. It's easier to make a game look amazing than it is to create an immersive world with a memorable cast and addicting action. Luckily, the Elder Scrolls series has a pedigree of quality releases.
The latest entry in the series, Skyrim, is looking pretty damn sweet. The screens we've seen so far display a huge leap in the eye candy department. This is good. If Skyrim can retain its ridiculous amount of immersion and depth of content, we're going to have a real winner on our hands. But let me not jump ahead of myself here, we still need to learn more and see more of this thing in motion. In the mean time, have some lovely screenshots!
Been a while since we visited Raccoon City, hasn't it? As the Resident Evil series has transitioned more from survival horror to the action genre, so has the scene shifted from Ground Zero to more exotic locations such as Europe and Africa. These locales have provided an interesting and perhaps equally creepy backdrop for a tale of zombies and virii, though honestly, there's no place like home.
Though the action returns to the familiar, apocalypse-torn home of the Umbrella Corporation, Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City is veering off the beaten path to take the Resident Evil franchise in a new direction. For this, Capcom has teamed up with Slant Six Games -- veteran developers of some of the more recent SOCOM series off-shoots -- infusing the current Resident Evil formula with a tactical twist and touch of multiplayer.
Operation Raccoon City has you -- and possibly three of your friends -- take control of an elite Umbrella Corporation squad tasked to infiltrate the city circa 1998, destroy any evidence of the T-Virus, and eliminate all survivors. As if slaughtering zombies and unwilling survivors wasn't enough, your crew will also have to deal with the unfriendly advances of United States Government special agents and their public funded weaponry.
The third-person, team based shooting action of Operation Raccoon City looks like a mix of SOCOM and Left 4 Dead. No complaints from me! Aside from the cooperative multiplayer campaign, Operation Raccoon City will also feature a number of competitive online multiplayer modes. With so many different sides involved in the battle within Raccoon City, online play could be really fun if done right. Hunk versus Licker versus psychotic armed citizen versus Leon Kennedy's wafting bangs. Let's dance!
When Valve Software announced J.K. Simmons as Cave Johnson, the CEO and voice of Aperture Science in Portal 2, I thought "Oh, cool." That's it, just cool. But the more I hear Cave speak, the more I'm absolutely enamored by the voice and the choice. Simmons' unique sound and excellent delivery not only lends some B-star credibility to Portal 2, but he also plays the the role perfectly.
In this, the second of Aperture Science's hilarious "investment opportunity" video series, Cave Johnson details the ways robots are more trusting than humans. Well, he's definitely convinced me. Now, not only am I going to layer my house in lovely panels, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to ditch all my friends and replace them with robots. Thank you Aperture Science!
The world needs more four-player cooperative futuristic ninja games, dammit. Thankfully Square Enix has answered the call with Moon Diver, the multiplayer ninja platformer created by the man who may have pioneered the genre, Kouichi Yotsui, designer of the arcade classic, Strider.
Ninjas are an easy sell for me, as is four-player co-op. Pairing the two means I'd buy four copies of the game, which I may consider for my tight-pocketed friends. I understand some may not be sold on what to me seems like a complete no-brainer. For those of you on the fence, there are three items to sway you into a purchase: a demo which is currently available on PSN, a launch trailer which is considerately attached to at the end of this post, and a katana to the neck!
Moon Diver is out today on PSN for $14.99, with an unspecified XBLA release sometime in April.
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 10:44AM 
;)
